To rant and rave about the december day off school for Queens Jubilee

[campsiemum]

So my DDs school has announced that they are closing a day early for Christmas so the children can celebrate the Queens Jubilee... which is in frikkin JUNE!

It seems to have been decided that as the jubilee is during half term, an extra day needs to be awarded..

As someone who has planned child care for the whole of Christmas already I am pissed off to now have to somehow cover an extra day.

So come on... just how unreasonable am I being?

(bonus points for "School isn't free child care" and double points for "you choose to work as well as have children so suck it up")

YANBU about the amount of notice give, really they should have let parents know when the Bank Holiday was announced.

Everyone gets 28 days leave a year (or the pro-rata'd equvilent) which includes bank holidays by law, if you're not getting that then you're being diddled as cat64 said

Most people however forget that you're not actually entitled to bank holiday's off, it's just that most employers "force" leave on those dates - cat, I suspect that campsie meant 4 weeks of her choosing plus 8 bank holidays i.e. the legal minimum

I suspect if anyone tried to tell any other profession they were not entitled to the same bank hols as the rest of the country they'd be up in arms. Different of course when it affects your childcare

Most places tag things onto hols to make it easier, avoid a random day off mid week sometime. Dec tends to be quieter in schools so it seems very logical to have it then, esp on 21st when many are already off work. 6 wks is loads of notice.

By the by, when I worked I had 5 weeks plus bank hols minimum...toured being diddled. Bank hols are statutory.

How can you say you know they don't finish at 3.30 then say it's still essentially part-time? I would leave around 5.30pm have a couple of hours break then do a couple more hours later in an evening. I also worked almost every sun morning.

DH is a lawyer. He could essentially also leave at 3.30 and do more at home as could most other professional friends I know. The holidays are good but that basically makes up for a ceiling salary of around 35k if you want to stay in the classroom. This is not something which applies to either my DH or most other professional friends we know. It's attitudes like yours that have contributed to me leaving to become an accountant.

I think it's bullshit as the Queen is a complete and utter waste of space.

However, you do have enough time to find childcare.

But I hate the Queen more, so, YANBU.

If teaching was a part time profession, you wouldn't get teachers working evenings and weekends and holidays, planning and marking work or coming in to sort out their classrooms etc. They'd literally work the hours they were contracted and no more.

I think teachers are only paid for the time they work, but their salaries are split into 12 so they don't have some months without wages. If that is true, then working through holidays, means they are working when they are not really getting paid to.

Karma is correct. Teachers are technically only paid for the 39 weeks we are in school, it's just divided into 12 monthly payments.

Not all schools are doing the extra day, ours certainly isn't, so a bit off to be ranting and raving at all of us part time glorified babysitters according to the OP teachers.

serious genuine question for the op
how old is your child? I am just amazed they never get/are ill(and jealous)

Oh what?? Another public holiday to 'celebrate' the bunch of freeloaders at Buck House? Great, just what my bank balance and childcare juggling doesn't need.

OP - YANBU. Sounds like nothing more than an extended holiday to suit the teachers tbh.

If you look on your county term dates it should turn up-with plenty of warning. I looked at random and Derby had

'Note: An additional bank holiday has been granted on Tuesday 5th June 2012 to celebrate the Queen's Diamond Jubilee. However, as schools are already closed on 5th June for half term; an extra day will be added to the break at the end of the Autumn 2011 term, therefore schools will return after the Christmas break on Thursday 5th January 2012.

It was on there with all the other holidays so has nothing to do with the school and the teachers-they must have been told with everyone else.

We have already taken our extra day at the school I teach in but the parents were informed of the dates for this calendar year about a year ago. Your school is DBU if they are only just telling you now.

He's nearly 6 - has never been ill her whole life. But she's been with a childminder in the company of several other kids since 12 weeks so she's probably built up an immunity.

If teachers day ends at 3.30pm but they work 2 ish hours extra, then they are working less than most of my peer group whose days finish at 5.50pm but they work on until 7.30pm+ PM.

Then there are the holidays. Again, I do have people very close to me in the profession so I'm not being a complete ignorant arse.

So - just to clarify - in essense it is the lack of notice that i object to. Plus the distance form the actual Queens Jubilee day which to me completely smacks of the teachers prefereing to take the day ahead of the Xmas holiday rather than arounf the time of the actual jubilee.

In no profession I have come in to contact with would this be acceptable. But hey ho, who am I to argue? I'm sure I'll find some willing friend or someone. It's dead easy to find extra childcare with 6 weeks notice when you have next to no real mummy friends as you've worked full time since your kid was 12 weeks old and your family live 200 miles away. And you've already covered 10 days care for that month.

The thing is teachers have no say in this. It is the bureaucrats at the LEA who decide the holidays, like snow days are down to the LEA/Head teacher. Classroom teachers are NOT RESPONSIBLE for this.

DO people seriously think anyone would want a Christmas Shopping Day on the 21st? wouldn't they have picked a random earlier day if that was the intention? I agree with everyone who says it is a legal right to take it and disagree with everyne who implies teachers are lazy/part time/organising the school calendar to suit themselves.

The teachers will have had this landed on them. Do you really think they had any say at all in this?

Also most people like random days added onto holidays rather than in the middle of a term. Pupils are excited by then and do less work. Perhaps this is the reason?

I honestly can't imagine there being too many complaints from the staff room if they were told that their holidays were to start a day early - makes it very easy for the teachers who are also parents (but not so easy for those parents who aren't teachers) to manage their childcare.

If teachers day ends at 3.30pm but they work 2 ish hours extra, then they are working less than most of my peer group whose days finish at 5.50pm but they work on until 7.30pm+ PM.

If teachers only did 2 hours after 3.30pm I would still be teaching!

How does it help their childcare? And even if they are pleased (as everyone else will be when they have their day off) that doesn't make it their choice or fault.

Also worth noting that I have worked as a teacher, and also as a global manager within a multinational earning 4 times what I did as a teacher. I cam categorically say that I worked far harder as a teacher, 2 hours overtime would be a miracle. I rarely had to take work home with me as a manager, however I couldn't have done my job as a teacher without hours of work every evening.

Me too, Exotic! I frequently worked until 5 or 5.30 then did a couple of extra hours later that evening.

I have known quite a few people (all women) leave and retrain as teachers when their kids were born or little thinking it was a more child friendly job that their original careers. Without fail, they have found the workload and inflexibility a huge shock. I know of two who gave it up after their nqt year and returned to what they were doing before.

Oh and you are very lucky that your DD has such a strong immune system which has meant you needing little time off when she's ill. I have four DCs so I don't suppose I'll be as lucky when I return to work next year. Oh and we have no family whatsoever, anywhere and my DH is often out of the country so I guess I'll have to have a system in place like most people do for these sorts of emergencies.

I'm debating not going back when I finish at home with dd and the next one. I won't get the hols (haha) but at least I will have my evenings and weekends back.

Ninky, My eldest, DS1, is almost 8yrs and in Y3. I knew I had to get out when I missed both his Nativity and sport day in Reception and couldn't come to his summer fayre because it was the same day as my own. First year of school and his mummy couldn't be there for anything. It made me so sad.

I gave up when I was pg with ds2 (12 years ago, now). Although there are some things I miss, sitting up until gone midnight marking coursework essays isn't one of them!

I'm probably going to regret posting this but I wish I had the working conditions/hours that campsiemum thinks I do.

I arrive in school between 7.30am and 7.45am
I work through my lunch break (either marking/running clubs/preparing for next lesson)
School finishes at 3.30pm - on 3 days a week I run clubs for another hour (this is voluntary and unpaid) on 1 day I have a staff meeting.
I leave school between 5.30pm and 6pm
I work for between 1 and 3 hours Monday - Thursday evenings
I must confess I do fuck all on a Friday night
I spend between 2 and 5 hours working at the weekend.

Add parent's evening/report writing/attending extra curricular weekend events/residentials into the equation and I'd love to know how it can be dismissed as part time

Tarquin, that sounds pretty standard to me. When I taught f/t I did one lunchtime club and two afterschool clubs; netball (stood in the freezing cold) and creative writing. Netball would run from Sept until Feb then I'd take a SATs booster class from Feb until May. None of this was paid of course.

Netball was for Y5&6 and I once had a Y5 parent complain that I wasn't offering an alternative for her Y5 DD after Feb as that now meant that she would have to pay for some form of afterschool care for her DD.